


Sigil Tinsel

by van_helsa124



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Christmas, Gabriel (Supernatural) is Loki, M/M, Mistletoe, Trickster Gabriel, lesson learnt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-12
Updated: 2014-12-13
Packaged: 2018-03-01 05:22:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2761178
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/van_helsa124/pseuds/van_helsa124
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean and Castiel are trapped in the bunker with a powerful pagan god. But is all as it seems? Is there a lesson to be learnt?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the destiel advent calender 2014...

Part one:

Apparently the men of letters had a sense of humour. Dean huffed, out of breath, as he pulled the last box of faded box of Christmas decorations from the shelf in the store room. Yeah, the devils trap ball-balls and pagan sigil tinsel must have been a great idea at the time but those kinda symbols mixed up could create some serious dark mojo. Dean was pretty sure he didn’t want to know how long they’d all been stewing together in those boxes for.  
He almost didn’t hear Cas enter the tiny room behind him, for someone without wings the angel was surprisingly light on his feet.  
“Dean, Sam has asked me to tell you that he is leaving to follow a lead on the case he is working on.” Cas announced before noticing the piles clutter around them. “Do I want to know why you have an angel sigil tree topper?”  
Dean snorted when he noticed the porcelain disk protruding from the closest box, “Yeah, these guys had a messed up idea of Christmas. You wanna give me hand with this stuff?”  
“I still don’t understand why you insist upon this, Dean.” Cas said, eyeing a particularly offensive wall-hanging written in enhochian. The angel had, for some reason, been completely against putting up decorations and a tree but Dean was working on changing that.  
Handing a few boxes to Castiel, he picked up a couple more and led the way through the bunker and out into main area. They put them down and Dean motioned for Cas to start unpacking what he could without summoning something from another dimension.  
It was laborious work. After spending so long in close proximity half of the decorations were practically cursed objects and by the time they’d finished a box each, Sam was already calling to check in and make sure things were going ok on their end. If Dean didn’t know better he would have thought is brother was making excuses to stay away. There was no way a simple salt and burn was going to take three days.  
After nearly seven hours of dodging rogue hexes they were just about ready to throw in the towel. Well… that was until Dean noticed one of the boxes was missing.  
“Dude, try not to touch anything,” he muttered, exhausted, “the last thing we need is you getting turned in a frickin frog or something.”  
Cas nodded as though it was something that could actually happen. “I will be careful Dean.”

The bunker was one of the safest places Dean knew but that didn’t mean it couldn’t be pretty damn spooky when you were the only one walking around. If it wasn’t for the occasional creaking of cooling metal and the intermittent clicking of the bulb Dean had been meaning to replace the place would have been completely silent.  
That’s why Dean almost had a cardiac when a crash echoed down the hallway from the store room. After a few moments to make sure he wasn’t in fact having a heart attack, he drew his gun and advanced slowly, debating whether or not he should call Cas for backup. Something could have just fallen off the shelf but he wasn’t taking any chances after the time they’d just had trying to untangle boxes of near apocalyptic decorations.  
Who knew what they could have awoken?  
As he neared the door his pulse shot up. Something was moving around in there and it sounded big- human big. Checking his gun once more Dean held his breath and burst round the doorframe, aiming at the stocky figure leaning over the box he’d come to collect.  
“Hands where I can see’ em!” if it even had hands…  
“That’s not gonna work on me, Kiddo.” the figure grunted, straightening and stepping somewhat into the light.  
Dean’s eyes widened, “Jesus…”  
“No, but people do keep asking if I was born in a barn.” Gabriel said with a flash of his practiced douchebag grin. “Long time no trick. I see things have been going terrible as usual.”

Ok, Dean was all up for coming back from the dead, hell he’d done it himself more times than he could count, but he was strangely against the second coming of an archangel/trickster/pagan god. He knew only too well the kind of tricks Gabriel liked to play on them, and Cas was in no shape to fight should something go down. Nothing good ever came out of archangels. Period.  
“You’re smart Dean I’ll give you that. We’re not exactly the trustworthy type but today I’m just here to spread a little holiday cheer.” Gabriel admitted, clearly trying his very best to look as innocent as possible.  
“Awesome… can you leave now?” Dean asked hurriedly, hearing Cas call his name from down the hall, “Oh, and don’t bother adding us to your Christmas list.”  
The archangel stalked lazily over to a shelf and picked up a small container covered in scribbled enhochian. He smiled at it sentimentally, as if it held some kind of deep meaning. “You remember what I told you the first time we met?” he ran his finger over the rim of the jar, “I liked you Dean, still do. You’ve got a, how should I put it… a spark?”  
Dean swallowed thickly. He didn’t like the sound of that.  
Gabriel’s hand wandered to the lid of the jar but before he could remove it Castiel appeared in the doorway, trench coat ruffled, light’s flickering behind him. “Brother no!” he shouted rushing forward but it was too late.  
The lid came away in one smooth movement and a flash lit the storage room. It was gone almost as quickly as it came yet Dean still had to screw his eyes closed against the intensity of the sudden light. When he opened them again the jar was gone, and so was the archangel.  
“Cas, do I wanna know what that was?”  
The angel glanced at him doubtfully, “We should try to contact Sam… he may be needed.”  
“That’s not reassuring, man.” Dean said pinching the bridge of his nose. “Just tell me whatever the fuck it is we’re dealing with.”  
“It’s an elemental, Dean.”  
“Awesome.”

After deciding to bring the last box of decorations with them, they cautiously made their way back to the main area, painfully aware that something was off but not quite sure what it was.  
Dean didn’t know much about elementals, but what he did know worried him. They were basically tree spirits with stronger than average plant powers - never good when the only weapon you have on you is a gun that shoots lead.  
Dumping the box on the floor he turned and surveyed the control room, nothing seemed to have changed but there was still something… above the door. In fact it was above every doorway, a small sprig of a green plant with white berries.  
“Hey, Cas… are you seeing this?”  
The angel nodded, “It’s Mistletoe.”  
“Yeah well, no shit Sherlock.”  
“No Dean. I mean it’s Mistletoe. All elementals are linked to a specific flora and I believe this one is Mistletoe.” Castiel said flatly, twirling a piece that just happened to have materialised on the table next to him. “You know the legend, yes?”  
Dean shrugged, “Uh, it’s a pagan ritual right… that kind of thing? I think dad told us the story when we were kids. You might have to refresh my memory a bit.”  
“Baldor was the most beloved of the Norse gods,” Cas began matter-of-factly, “so it is said that his mother, Frigga, went round and asked all the plants and animals for their vow that they would never kill him, all but Mistletoe. The plant was small and always overlooked so she was unaware of her mistake. Loki on the other hand, knew all too well that he could use it to his advantage.” Dean couldn’t help but smirk as Cas rolled his eyes dramatically, “So, when Frigga invited all the gods to test her son’s invincibility, Loki fashioned a dart from Mistletoe and killed Baldor dead. To make sure the mistake would never happen again she decreed that the plant would be hung above doorways and she would place a kiss on whoever stood there...”  
“Please, you sound like a pagan history textbook! Maybe somebody should pay you to do audio tapes? I’m sure you’d send those kids right to sleep in minutes.” That voice did not come from Dean.

They both turned to face the unlikely creature that’d materialised before them. 

Of course it was Dean who burst into a fit of laughter… he didn’t know whether to kill the thing or give it a sandwich.  
To anyone else the lanky teenager standing just across the room, dressed in tight fitting jeans and a dark green baggy hoodie that half covered his face, would have seemed harmless. But they knew better.  
Castiel failed to see what Dean found so funny about the situation. “So,” the angel said, cautiously addressing the pagan before them, “You’re Mistletoe?”  
“My friends call me Mist but, in essence, yes. And it’s all true by the way- I did kill Baldor, and thanks to that I’m more powerful than I’ve ever been! I’m not just an elemental anymore, I’m a god.” He held out his hands dramatically and the sprigs hanging in the doorways exploded into life, growing quickly, blocking off the exits and leaving them trapped in the main room. “I really should thank Loki; he hasn’t done me wrong so far.”  
Dean blinked, confused, “I swear I was only kidnapped by Baldor and his little posy of pagans a few years ago though…?”  
Castiel was about to answer but Mistletoe cut him off again, this time with a wave of his hand. “Pagans are like lamps, yes you can smash a bulb, even pull out the cable or turn off the power, but replace that and turn it back on and it still works. Killing one of our kind is always like that. It’s the true essence of immortality Dean, you can kill us but we won’t die. It might take centuries, or even millennium, but we always come back as long as we have followers.”  
It was safe to say that no one knew what to say after that.  
Silence overcame them for a good few moments until it became almost painfully awkward. Just standing there, looking at each other. And it was safe to say that Dean was pretty confused right about now. So far all this all-powerful elemental had done was give them the basics on pagans and boast about how great he was.  
“So, that’s all very good, and kinda creepy when you think about it, but what do you want with us? If you wanna be free you’re gonna have to release us so we can break the warding around this place.” Dean asked eventually, not really wanted to be stood like that when Sam got back- which would be god knows when.  
Mistletoe crossed his arms in a very human teenager like gesture and huffed, annoyed, “I’m here because Loki asked me to stick around and do him a favour. He’s done so much for me after all.” With another wave of the pagan’s hand, one of the doors closest to them cleared slowly. “Yes I may be an elemental, but I’m also the god of ignored and over looked things. I’m trying to teach you a lesson, Dean. Now… run!”


	2. Chapter 2

Part two:

Dean didn’t need to be asked twice. He grabbed Castiel buy the collar of his trench coat and, after a seconds thought, the last unsorted box of decorations and bolted for the exit with angel in tow.   
Sure enough the door sealed behind them not a second after they’d made it through, but they didn’t stop there. The storage room was only a few meters down the hall.  
Inside the pair locked the door firmly behind them. Castiel used his strength to push a large set of filling cabinets in front of it, while Dean scanned the shelves franticly for something they could use against an elemental/god. Who knew maybe there’d be another one of those jars lying around?  
And what kind of lesson did Gabriel want this guy to teach them anyway?  
Dean was pretty sure any class the archangel planned was one he’d like to skip.  
The dim light in the store room was just enough to see by, but it was already giving Dean a headache. Cas had been unusually quiet since their encounter. He hadn’t spoken a word in the last fifteen minutes and that was starting to worry Dean.  
He looked over at the angel, worried, “Are you ok, dude?”  
“Something is not right.” Castiel said sternly. There was something about the way he said it that made Dean’s nervous. “Usually elementals share the weaknesses of their plant counterparts. But Mistletoe is now a god too which means that that part should have been erased… well it should have, but I can’t be sure that it has. I can’t seem to figure it out. Something doesn’t feel right about this.”  
Dean frowned, “Well what do we know about the plant? It’s green right? It has berries and grows in trees and…”  
“That’s it!” Castiel began with more excitement than Dean had seen in angel for a while. “Mistletoe can grow in tree tops because it’s parasitic; it feeds off of the trees it lives in. There’s something that’s been bothering me since the beginning. How is he this strong already? He’s been locked in a jar for father knows how long, cut off from prayers and rituals… it should have taken weeks to reach full power again. So how did he charge up so quickly?”  
Ok now the Winchester was starting to understand, “He’s a parasite, and he’s feeding off of us? So what? We cut off his food supply?”  
“Exactly...”  
“Wait,” Dean said stopping short, apparently he’d been pacing with Cas, “what’s he been feeding on? I don’t feel any different. Do you?”  
Cas paused. There was something in it that made Dean wonder whether he really wanted to hear what was coming next. “Mistletoe said he was the god of ignored things. What are we overlooking? What ignorance is he feeding on?”  
“I don’t know but I don’t think we have much time.”  
He was right. The door to the storage closet was being forced open by thick stalks of waxy green. It wouldn’t have been long before it fell in on itself. In desperation Dean emptied the box of decorations onto the floor and began to rifle through them quickly, looking for something, anything that could help them.  
He was about to throw a ball-ball when Castiel grabbed his wrist, “Stop.”  
Dean looked at the tree decoration. “What is it?”  
“It’s an old enhochian transportation spell,” the angel muttered taking hold of it, “how it ended up on a festive ornament is beyond my understanding. But all it would take to activate is a spark of… grace.”  
Dean suddenly felt as though he was falling. The floor seemed to drop out from under him… 

When he opened his eyes again he was in the kitchen. Pots and pans were strewn across the floor like a whirlwind had blown through.  
“The hell happened in here?” Dean sighed, standing up to assess the damage to the kitchen he’d cleaned only that morning.  
Castiel didn’t look at all guilty, “The transportation spell must have been tainted by the other symbols in the box. There was more of an energy discharge than I was expecting.”  
“Well, you’re cleaning this up later because I did it this morning so…” he paused, “did you hear that? Where is that coming from?”  
A buzzing noise echoed down the corridor, filling the kitchen. Whatever it was it was getting closer and it was moving fast.  
The angel peered round the door way and stepped out, “We should move Dean. Mistletoe will find us soon if we stay.”  
“Yeah… ok.”  
They hurried back through the hallways, constantly aware of the sprigs of waxy plant above their heads and the fact that they were being hunted by a pagan god who wanted to teach them a ‘lesson’.  
After a couple of minutes they arrived at a dead end. The door before them was sealed shut. A wall of plants was successfully blocking their way into the main area. Without hesitating Castiel reached forward with his hand and illuminated the wall, burning away the natural material in one burst of energy.  
“Why couldn’t you have done that ages ago?” Dean complained following him through the opening before it closed up again.  
The angel looked over his shoulder. “I did not attempt it because I wished to find out more about our adversary before making a move. It would have been pointless if I did not believe it would work and the energy wasted could have been vital later on.”  
“Good point.”

The main room was a mess. Tables upturned, books torn off of the shelves, chair’s smashed… and Dean was pretty sure the pagan had done it purely to mess with them. There was no need for all that destruction, even if the dude had been trapped in a jar for a while.  
And of course Mistletoe was waiting for them.  
The immortal teenager stood almost exactly where he had before, watching them with an amused grin. He had his hood back now, exposing his snowy white hair and greenish complexion that made him seems less human.  
“Well,” the god asked expectantly, “have we learnt anything?”  
“Yeah, that you’re a dick.” Dean fired back.  
Castiel rolled his eyes, amused.  
Mistletoe didn’t seem to find it so funny. “You humans- and angels- can be so stubborn. How do you ever survive? You never see the things that are right in front of you… the subtle connections that bind you to the world. It would be frustrating if it wasn’t what fuelled my powers. So you could say that in a way I’m glad you two are so blind. I don’t think I’ve ever had a power source so strong before.” he shook his head, “The things people will ignore to keep their assumptions about themselves intact.”  
Out of the corner of his eye Dean watched Cas’s face twist into one of understanding. The angel’s eyes widened for the briefest moment before he set his features into that determined expression that usually had demons fleeing in the other direction.  
Dean didn’t have another moment to register what was happening before a rock-solid hand was on the back of his neck pulling him down. Firm lips met his own and he blinked as his brain struggled to catch up to what was happening.  
Cas had them locked in a kiss- and not a tame one either. What else had that guy learnt from the pizza man?  
And Dean was not kissing back. Nope.   
Ok maybe he was a little.  
Cas was his friend. It should have felt wrong, horribly so.  
But it didn’t. In fact he kinda liked it…. kinda liked Cas…

Motherfucker.

“Finally!” They broke off and pulled away as Gabriel popped up next to them, flinging a handful of confetti over their heads. “You know, if this didn’t work I was actually planning on bribing a cupid to get the job done.”  
“Gab…” Dean was cut off. He choked uselessly on air for a few seconds before he gave up on speaking.  
The archangel held out a small box to the pagan beside him with a smile. “Pleasure doing business with you.”  
Mistletoe smirked, pulling his hood up and taking the object and muttering a low ‘anytime’ before disappearing at a click of his fingers.  
With an exaggerated gesture of his hand, Gabriel motioned to the mistletoe positioned over their heads. “Congrats kiddos, when’s the wedding?”  
“Gabriel this was uncalled for.” Castiel said firmly, stepping out in front of Dean as though the archangel couldn’t simply blast through him with a twitch.  
Gabriel pushed his lips together in a pout, “Maybe but would you two have listened to me? You know, people have been hinting at it for so long now that if someone straight out told you, I wouldn’t be betting on if they’d be murdered, I’d be betting on how.”  
“But…”  
“Now, now Deano, what have we learnt about interrupting me?”  
Dean sighed, still trying to process what was going on. The whole situation, everything that had happened, was to get him and Cas to kiss and realise that… oh god... that they were kinda into each other.  
He didn’t hear Gabriel approach but suddenly the archangel was standing right between him and a very confused Castiel.  
“I told you, you’ve got a spark. And it seems I wasn’t the only one to notice.” Gabriel and Castiel exchanged glances. There was something so brotherly about it that Dean felt his pose soften slightly. “I’ll tell you what, because I like you I’ll clean this place up. Hmm? What ’ya say? Leave you and Cassie to get, uh, more acquainted with your new arrangement?”  
Dean huffed, “Fine but you better clean the frickin kitchen.”   
“Deal,” The archangel snapped his fingers, leaving behind the scent of cinnamon sticks and candy canes. 

“You guys did all of this while I was gone?”  
They both looked up to see Sam at the top of the stairs, slack jawed. He wasn’t supposed to be back yet… three days he said! He should have been flipping out about the mess, but that wasn’t Sam’s ‘I’m going to kill the pair of you’ face.  
Confused, Dean looked around to find that the place wasn’t a shambles as it had been only a few seconds ago. Instead of broken furniture and piles of clutter, everything was back in its normal place that the freshly sorted decorations had been hung to perfection.   
“Uh no, actually it was…” Cas was going to say but stopped as he laid his eyes on the new tree topper. 

Perched above the Christmas tree was an angel figurine complete with flowing golden robes… and Gabriel’s sarcastic features.


End file.
